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Excerpted from AnnCoulter.com; read the whole column HERE. Note the part about Tinky Winky: yes, Virginia, there is a conspiracy — a conspiracy in the liberal, pro-“gay” media to make good people committed to Biblical values look stupid — and Falwell was a victim:
JERRY FALWELL — SAY HELLO TO RONALD REAGAN!
May 16, 2007
No man in the last century better illustrated Jesus’ warning that “All men will hate you because of me” than the Rev. Jerry Falwell, who left this world on Tuesday. Separately, no man better illustrates my warning that it doesn’t pay to be nice to liberals.
Falwell was a perfected Christian. He exuded Christian love for all men, hating sin while loving sinners. This is as opposed to liberals, who just love sinners. Like Christ ministering to prostitutes, Falwell regularly left the safe confines of his church to show up in such benighted venues as CNN.
He was such a good Christian that back when we used to be on TV together during Clinton’s impeachment, I sometimes wanted to say to him, “Step aside, reverend — let the mean girl handle this one.” (Why, that guy probably prayed for Clinton!)
For putting Christ above everything — even the opportunity to make a humiliating joke about Clinton — Falwell is known as “controversial.” Nothing is ever as “controversial” as yammering about Scripture as if, you know, it’s the word of God or something.
From the news coverage of Falwell’s death, I began to suspect his first name was “Whether You Agree With Him or Not.”
Even Falwell’s fans, such as evangelist Billy Graham and former President Bush, kept throwing in the “We didn’t always agree” disclaimer. Did Betty Friedan or Molly Ivins get this many “I didn’t always agree with” qualifiers on their deaths? And when I die, if you didn’t always agree with me, would you mind keeping it to yourself?
Let me be the first to say: I ALWAYS agreed with the Rev. Falwell. ….
… I note that in Falwell’s list of Americans he blamed for ejecting God from public life, only the gays got a qualifier. Falwell referred to gays and lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle. ….
… Also the ones who promote the gay lifestyle in a children’s cartoon.
Beginning in early 1998, the news was bristling with stories about a children’s cartoon PBS was importing from Britain that featured a gay cartoon character, Tinky Winky, the purple Teletubbie with a male voice and a red handbag.
People magazine gleefully reported that Teletubbies was “aimed at Telebabies as young as 1 year. But teenage club kids love the products’ kitsch value, and gay men have made the purse-toting Tinky Winky a camp icon.”
In the Nexis archives for 1998 alone, there are dozens and dozens of mentions of Tinky Winky being gay — in periodicals such as Newsweek, The Toronto Star, The Washington Post (twice!), The New York Times and Time magazine (also twice).
In its Jan. 8, 1999, issue, USA Today accused The Washington Post of “outing” Tinky Winky, with a “recent Washington Post In/Out list putting T.W. opposite Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche, essentially ‘outing’ the kids’ show character.”
Michael Musto of The Village Voice boasted that Tinky Winky was “out and proud,” noting that it was “a great message to kids — not only that it’s OK to be gay, but the importance of being well accessorized.”
All this appeared before Falwell made his first mention of Tinky Winky.
After one year of the mainstream media laughing at having put one over on stupid bourgeois Americans by promoting a gay cartoon character in a TV show for children, when Falwell criticized the cartoon in February 1999, that same mainstream media howled with derision that Falwell thought a cartoon character could be gay….
UPDATE on this story: Chicago Sun-Times religion columnist Cathleen Falsani — author of a controversial column titled, “Sigh of Relief over Falwell’s Death” — contacted Americans For Truth late Friday afternoon for the sole purpose of requesting that we remove her copyrighted photo from our website (which we did). When AFTAH President Peter LaBarbera sought to engage Falsani in a discussion about her anti-Falwell column, she curtly said she was only calling for the “legal purpose” of removing the photo. “I’m not interested in engaging in dialogue with you,” she said.
When LaBarbera countered that this was odd since Falsani is a “reporter” who talks to people for a living, Falsani replied that she is not a reporter, but a columnist. (As you can read below, she was only recently relieved of her reporting duties at the Sun-Times.)
Said LaBarbera, “This story only gets weirder: a religion columnist cruelly trashes a conservative minister days after his death, then refuses to discuss her column with a critic. It seems Cathleen Falsani can dish it out but she can’t take it. We echo Illinois Review editor Fran Eaton’s call for Falsani to be fired as a Sun-Times religion columnist. As one who is obviously bigoted against Bible-believing religious traditionalists, she should not be writing on religion for a major metropolitan daily.”
In fact, my very first thought upon hearing of the Rev. Falwell’s passing was: Good. And I didn’t mean “good” in a oh-good-he’s-gone-home-to-be-with-the-Lord kind of way. I meant “good” as in “Ding-dong, the witch is dead.” — Cathleen Falsani, “Sigh of Relief over Falwell’s Death,” May 18, Chicago Sun-Times
I wrote Cathleen Falsani to say how sad it is that a religion columnist would so cruelly denounce and defame a man shortly after his death. (More of that HERE.) The Religious Left — of which one could now safely say Falsani is a member — prides itself on its compassion, but when it comes down to it, they can be quite mean and guilty of the same harshness and “hate” of which they accuse others. It reminds me of the pro-abortion-rights liberals who fancy themselves as compassionate people who look out for the downtrodden (“the little guy”) — and yet can’t face their own hypocrisy in zealously defending the “right to choose” to kill society’s most helpless people: the unborn.
Sometimes Christian-identified writers and reporters go overboard in attacking Biblical traditionalists to show their media peers that they’re not a tool of the stereotypical “religious right.” Maybe that’s what happened here. Whether or not that’s the case, it’s tragic that Falsani, a Wheaton College grad, has sunk to this level. This is an ugly and tacky piece of writing that exposes the hypocrisy of self-righteous liberals and the disdain of the media for traditionalist Christian leaders.
Like many in the Fourth Estate, Falsani needs sensitivity training and would surely benefit from a sabbatical at Falwell’s Liberty University. She should be removed as the Sun-Times’ religion columnist (at least she is no longer a religion reporter for the paper), but that won’t happen because most of the paper’s staff probably loved her column. Nothing like beating up on the ‘fundies,’ dead or alive, to burnish your credentials in the media. (Now, writing a fair column about a man or woman who has left homosexuality behind, through the power of the same Christ that Falsani professes to follow, that’s another story….)
Congratulations, Cathleen: you scored some more points with the Left, but you did so at the price of your own dignity, your Christian testimony, and to the detriment of your once noble profession.— Peter LaBarbera
The following is excerpted by Media Research Council’s “NewsBusters” blog, by Tim Graham (emphasis added). You can read Graham’s entire piece by clicking HERE, and Falsani’s nasty column HERE):
It might not be surprising for liberal blog commenters or talk-radio callers to denounce Rev. Jerry Falwell upon his death, but it’s a little more surprising when it comes to a professed Christian who’s religion columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times. Cathleen Falsani reflected on her first reaction about hearing Falwell was “relief” and compared him to gangster TV character Tony Soprano:
Knowing I didn’t have a deadline to meet that day, my first thoughts were not of what to say or write.
In fact, my very first thought upon hearing of the Rev. Falwell’s passing was: Good.
And I didn’t mean “good” in a oh-good-he’s-gone-home-to-be-with-the-Lord kind of way. I meant “good” as in “Ding-dong, the witch is dead.”
But that thought — good riddance, I suppose — was not meant to be cruel or malicious. [!]After all, the faith that the Rev. Falwell and I share teaches us that he was, at that moment, in a far better place, with Jesus in heaven, and not roasting on a spit in Hell’s kitchen.
By shrugging off his mortal coil, the Rev. Falwell had ceased to suffer the pain of humanity.
Still, I’m not particularly proud of my knee-jerk reaction. But there it is….
My initial reaction to the Rev. Falwell’s death was, and remains, relief — not unlike the ease I felt when a particularly nasty bully who used to spit at me on the playground and threaten to beat me up after school moved to another town.
The Rev. Falwell was a spiritual bully. He was the Tony Soprano to Pat Robertson’s Paulie Walnuts.
How on Earth can a religion columnist compare a televangelist to a malicious mob boss and killer? We could understand the typical Elmer Gantry comparisons, but Tony Soprano? Including Robertson on the list suggested clearly that was Falsani believes is that conservatism and orthodoxy are “bullying” and that liberalism and relativism brings true spirituality and harmony with God.
Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
On hearing of the death of Jerry Falwell (read pro-family tributes to him HERE), I was reminded of an incident that revealed his heart, as a Christian and as a human being. Homosexual activists heaped instantaneous (and horrifyingly wicked) scorn upon this man of God — in a way that only seems to confirm what he said about their movement.
Their sickening behavior also confirms what the Bible says about God giving up unrepentant homosexuals to a “reprobate” (also translated depraved and debased) mind (Romans 1:28).
But before we get into the homosexuals’ vicious response to Falwell’s death, a history lesson: conservative icon Richard Viguerie states in his tribute to the Moral Majority founder:
“With the death of Dr. Jerry Falwell, the conservative movement has lost one its founders and key leaders. Dr. Falwell was one of the main architects of the conservative movement in the 1970s and 1980s. His work and leadership played an indispensable role in the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980.
“For decades, the conservative movement stood on a two-legged stool and won few elections. But when Dr. Falwell became an integral part of the movement, he led tens of thousands of ministers, along with millions of their followers, into the voting booths to support vital conservative causes. This provided the third leg of the stool, which allowed conservatives to level the political playing field with the Left.
“Without Dr. Falwell, there would be no meaningful conservative movement. He was a true history-maker in our nation.”
And now, on to the “Immoral Minority’s” reaction:
John Aravosis, a homosexual blogger who certainly fits the bill, called Falwell a “hateful pig,” inspiring a slew of even nastier comments on his “Americablog” site. Said one: “Too bad [Falwell’s death] wasn’t more prolonged and painful.” Wrote another: “Now cross your fingers for Pat Robertson to join him in Heaven soon.” Many of the remarks are too vulgar to reprint here.
As is the trend on the Left these days, many of the anti-Falwell posters used religious condemnations to make their point: “The gates of hell swing open and Satan welcomes his beloved son,” wrote Amanda Marcotte, a “Pandagon” blogger who became a short news story herself after it was revealed that she had been hired by Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards — but who now, after being fired by Edwards, is once again free to spew her venom.
Homosexual activist Wayne Besen, the former spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, the world’s largest “gay” lobby group, wrote on his site, next to an altered photo of Falwell (how mature, Wayne…): “Won’t the good preacher be shocked when he finds himself at the gates of Hell this morning! Man, I would love to post that video on YouTube. I must go now and mourn, as I can hardly contain my sorrow.”
Poor, pitiful Wayne. More proof that nobody hates like the Left in this country.
Some homosexual activists in San Francisco even held a public celebration of Falwell’s death — a spectacle that more savvy “gay” leaders warned would backfire.
The latter were right. As libertarian Bill Barnwell writes in a piece titled, “Celebrating the Death of Jerry Falwell”: “I cannot recall a time I read about Falwell making statements where he laughed off or celebrated the death of a gay person.”
Besen, Aravosis and their ilk hate in the name of their twisted version of “tolerance,” but Falwell was no hater — as most Christians who disagree with the homosexual cause are not haters but good people simply trying to follow God’s unchanging moral law.
The real Falwell: hugging homosexuals
Back in 1999, under the threat of a large protest from from Mel White — founder of the “gay” group Soulforce and an evangelical writer who left his wife and family to pursue a sexual relationship with a man — Falwell agreed to host a joint media event with White at his famous Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia. There was a contingent of mostly homosexual students and activists there to cheer on White, and a corresponding crowd of Liberty University students and pro-family advocates, including myself, backing Falwell’s position.
After the media event, the main participants and the “gay” Soulforce activists and kids went to unwind at a banquet room where pastries and drinks were served. And that is where the stereotype of Jerry Falwell as “homophobe” and “hatemonger” fizzled before everyone’s eyes, but especially those of the young “gay” activists.
In the corner of the room, Mel White conferred with his strategists — probably upset that the event did not turn out to be as useful a “gay” propaganda event as he had hoped. White nervously looked over at Falwell in the center of the room, but the contrast between the two men’s demeanors could not have been more pronounced. For there was the gregarious Falwell, wearing a huge smile and laughing, putting his big arms around the Soulforce kids as he posed for one souvenir “celebrity” photo after another.
This was not just a show for the crowd — the media weren’t even present — this was the real deal. Falwell was like a big teddy bear having a genuine good time playing host and showing Christian love to the confused Soulforce kids who, I’m sure, were experiencing a bit of cognitive dissonance.
I did not know Jerry Falwall personally, but from my experience that day at his church, I don’t think there was a hateful bone in his body. As Tony Perkins of Family Research Council said yesterday, Falwell was “a very, very loving, friendly, happy guy,” much loved by the students at the Liberty University, which he founded.
Publicity shot for Brokeback Mountain: not appropriate for adults, much less for young kids in the classroom
WARNING: offensive descriptions of unnatural acts that should NEVER be promoted to children
CHICAGO (AP) – A girl and her grandparents have sued the Chicago Board of Education, alleging that a substitute teacher showed the R-rated film “Brokeback Mountain” in class.
The lawsuit claims that Jessica Turner, 12, suffered psychological distress after viewing the movie in her 8th grade class at Ashburn Community Elementary School last year….
Alas, more corruption of youth at the hands of pro-homosexual activists. The movement that once asked just to be left alone is now pushing homosexuality on middle school students. In Chicago, a substitute teacher — no doubt a liberal “change agent” hell-bent on advancing her version of “tolerance and diversity” — showed the homosexual propaganda film “Brokeback Mountain” to her 8th-grade class (see full story below). Now the school is facing a $500,000 lawsuit. Let’s hope and pray that Jessica Turner’s grandparents prevail and that their legal action sends an expensive lesson to liberal educators nationwide — one that future Tolerance Tyrants (like Ms. Buford) seeking to manipulate young minds cannot ignore.
I saw Brokeback Mountain in the theater because I had to. It is a highly effective propaganda film well-suited to exploit today’s widespread confusion over “sexual orientation” and “same-sex love.” The film is about two male cowboys who “fall in love,” and features a sudden sodomitic encounter in a tent that is, well, let’s just say, biological and medical fantasy. The film, of course, seeks to advance the fiction that “gay” romantic love is just like the normal variety except with different genders. But that ignores, for one thing, the terrible damage that sodomy (i.e., anal sex) exacts on the body. That’s why many male initiates into homosexual sex get high on drugs or alcohol first — to dull the pain (and the shame) of this unnatural and sinful behavior.
If Brokeback were honest, one of the guys involved in the scene depicting the crime against nature (how sodomy was once regarded back when men were men) would be howling in pain louder than a coyote, rather than just rolling over and going to sleep. But, hey, we wouldn’t want to spoil the cultural elites’ pro-“gay” party by telling Americans about the pain and consequences stemming from homosexual behavior, would we?
It’s sort of like how many schools nowadays teach kids about HIV/AIDS without mentioning the “inconvenient truth” that this awful disease in America is strongly linked to “men who have sex with men” (MSM). (The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that through 2006, “MSM account for approximately 45% of newly reported HIV/AIDS diagnoses and nearly 54% of cumulative AIDS diagnoses.”)
Predictably, in Brokeback, one of the male lovers is savagely murdered by homosexual-hating hetero cowboys — another lesson I’m sure the militant Chicago teacher wanted to impress on her captive audience: if you disagree with the homosexual lifestyle, you are a “hater” and mean-spirited “homophobe.” Never mind that the vast majority of people who oppose homosexual behavior do not hate people but merely agree with God about harmful and changeable behaviors that do not define a person; and decent people are rightfully outraged at the idea of promoting this dangerous homosexual lifestyle to impressionable children.
We have no choice but to be aggressive with the truth, because our foes are so aggressive in promoting their lies — even to innocent kids in the classroom. I’m afraid that in our society, even children brought up well by moral-minded parents will have drunk some of the pro-“gay” Kool-Aid by the time they reach adulthood — so saturated is our culture with politically correct, activist nonsense on this issue.
Here’s the May 13 AP story on Brokeback Mountain being shown to 8th-graders in Chicago:
CHICAGO (AP) – A girl and her grandparents have sued the Chicago Board of Education, alleging that a substitute teacher showed the R-rated film “Brokeback Mountain” in class.
The lawsuit claims that Jessica Turner, 12, suffered psychological distress after viewing the movie in her 8th grade class at Ashburn Community Elementary School last year.
The film, which won three Oscars, depicts two cowboys who conceal their homosexual affair.
Turner and her grandparents, Kenneth and LaVerne Richardson, are seeking around $500,000 in damages.
“It is very important to me that my children not be exposed to this,” said Kenneth Richardson, Turner’s guardian. “The teacher knew she was not supposed to do this.”
According to the lawsuit filed Friday in Cook County Circuit Court, the video was shown without permission from the students’ parents and guardians.
The lawsuit also names Ashburn Principal Jewel Diaz and a substitute teacher, referred to as “Ms. Buford.”
The substitute asked a student to shut the classroom door at the West Side school, saying: “What happens in Ms. Buford’s class stays in Ms. Buford’s class,” according to the lawsuit.
Richardson said his granddaughter was traumatized by the movie and had to undergo psychological treatment and counseling.
In 2005, Richardson complained to school administrators about reading material that he said included curse words.
“This was the last straw,” he said. “I feel the lawsuit was necessary because of the warning I had already given them on the literature they were giving out to children to read. I told them it was against our faith.”
Messages left over the weekend with CPS officials were not immediately returned.
To listen online to this sermon, click HERE; to read the entire sermon, go HERE. To learn more about John Piper, visit HERE.
By John Piper October 11, 1998
Romans 1:24-28
Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. 25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. 26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. 28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper.
Astonishing Relevance In our exposition of Paul’s letter to the Romans, we come now to this astonishingly relevant section in 1:24-28 where Paul touches on the reality of homosexuality. It is relevant for many reasons. For example, yesterday there was conference called “Here I Stand” to address the issue of homosexually active clergymen in the ELCA (Star Tribune, 10/10/98). On the front page of the Star Tribune there was the story of what appeared to be a hate crime against a homosexual student at the University of Wyoming who was in critical condition after being tied to a fence and beaten. In August, 641 Anglican bishops from around the world gathered for the Lambeth Conference in Canterbury, England, and voted overwhelmingly to affirm that homosexual practice is “incompatible with Scripture.”
Full-page ads were recently [in 1998] taken out in USA Today and the New York Times and the Washington Post showing some 850 former homosexuals who gathered last summer at the Exodus conference and who declared there is power in Christ to be changed. Here in Minnesota, legal cases continually crop up about child custody and adoption of children by homosexual people. And most immediate of all, here in our church there are people who have homosexual desires and many more people among us who have people in their families whom they care about very deeply who consider themselves homosexual. The reality of homosexuality is inescapable today, and this would come as no surprise to the apostle Paul, and therefore should not to us.
One of the things that makes matters unusual today is the effort on the part of some people to defend the legitimacy of homosexual behavior from the Bible. Most common, for example, is the claim that the denunciations of homosexuality in the New Testament are not references to committed, long-term homosexual relations, which these people say are legitimate, but rather refer to promiscuous homosexual relations and to pederasty, which are not legitimate. To use the words of one scholar, “What the New Testament is against is something significantly different from a homosexual orientation which some people seem to have from their earliest days. In other words, the New Testament is not talking about what we have come to speak of as sexual inversion. Rather, it is concerned with sexual perversion” (Paul Jewett, Interpretation, April, 1985, p. 210).
“What’s clear from our experience and from science is that being gay or lesbian is an immutable, unchangeable gift from God, one for which I am very grateful. And it would fly in the face of my respect for God to give that gift back. It would simply be unethical and hurtful to our relationship with the Creator to give back gifts that God has given us….” — Homosexual activist Harry Knox of the “gay” lobby group Human Rights Campaign, on MSNBC debate 3-23-07
Woe to those who call evil good and good evil,
who put darkness for light
and light for darkness.– Old Testament prophet Isaiah (Is. 5:20)
Harry Knox promotes Big Lie for HRC
Please take five minutes to watch the fascinating online YouTube video above (click the “play” button on the screen) of a March 23, 2007 MSNBC debate between homosexual activist Harry Knox and pro-family warrior Matt Barber. The first time I watched this, I was flabbergasted at the gall of Knox, Director of the Religion and Faith Program for Human Rights Campaign (HRC, the world’s most powerful homosexual pressure group).
What better example of Hitler’s “Big Lie” technique than to transform homosexuality from an abominable sin and perversion … to a sickness … to a condition … to an inborn “orientation” that is actually a gift from God!
Yeah, that’s it — a wonderful gift that you’d never want to give back! (Strange how so many homosexual men are getting sick and dying in the prime of their life from practicing their supposed heavenly “gift.”)
I think we’ve discovered Satan’s Talking Points on homosexuality in the swank D.C. offices of Human Rights Campaign. HRC strategists understand that to neutralize America’s religious opposition to their destructive agenda, they must co-opt Christianity and the Bible itself.
The notion that homosexual “orientation” is a “gift from God” is the biggest lie in a “gay” arsenal filled with falsehoods — so start looking for that liberal echo chamber we call “the media” to begin giving it wide play.
The MSNBC debate was instigated by Al Mohler’s column (naively ill-timed, in my view) speculating on the possibility of hormone treatments to “fix” homosexuality in the womb if a genetic component to homosexuality were to be discovered.
By the way, Knox’s able opponent on the MSNBC debate, my good friend Matt Barber, is Policy Director for Cultural Issues at Concerned Women for America. Matt is a former professional heavyweight boxer (you can watch one his knockouts online on YouTube HERE) who was fired by the insurance giant Allstate after writing an online article — on his own time — critical of homosexual “marriage.” (Ironically, it was an HRC staffer who spotted Matt’s article and reported him to the Diversity Police at Allstate, leading to his firing. Oh, but I almost forgot: it is those poor, aggrieved homosexuals who are getting fired by the thousands “just for being gay” ….)
Matt is also former Corporate Outreach Director for Americans For Truth. We’re delighted that thanks to Allstate’s intolerance and pro-homosexual corporate agenda, he’s now “in the ring” in Washington, D.C., throwing rhetorical jabs on the side of God and truth.
Our next e-mail will discuss how adult homosexual activists like Knox and Soulforce’s Mel White are corrupting impressionable youth — a spiritual “crime” for which they will one day pay dearly if they don’t repent and turn away from their evil promotion of sexual sin.
Again, here is that YouTube link for the MSNBC debate featuring Harry Knox’s Big Lie about God. And please pray that God will lead the confused and lost Mr. Knox out of homosexuality.
Can a holy God “bless” a homosexual relationship? I don’t think so, but that’s what the wife of a self-styled “theologically conservative” Christian professor asked God to do for homosexual activist (and Wayne State philosophy professor) John Corvino and his male partner, below. Here’s the comment I posted today to Corvino’s article, “Amazing Grace,” on the website Independent Gay Forum, which is geared toward less radical homosexual advocates (their motto is “Forging a Gay Mainstream”).
Please note that I mistakenly ascribed the Christian professor’s wife’s prayer to him, which I corrected in a subsequent comment:
John, this professor friend may call himself a “theological conservative,” but apparently he is not. (Maybe he is only by today’s liberal academic standards.) Embracing “civil” same-sex “marriage,” gay adoption, and asking God to bless your homosexual relationship [which the professor’s wife actually did] puts him outside the “theologically conservative” (i.e., orthodox Biblical) camp. He was kind to you, yes, but erred in asking a holy God to bless a relationship based on sexual misbehavior clearly condemned by the same “God-breathed” Scripture that he surely regards as inerrant. He may and probably did have some secret prayer regarding your relationship — say, that it become non-sexual — but by asking God, before you, to “bless” it wrongly implied God’s acceptance, and thereby misled you about the Christian faith. It might have been more difficult, but the professor could have extended the same kindness to you without compromising the Biblical position.
The essence of evangelical, Bible-believing outreach to people (“non-believers”) is to warn them about the grave consequences of their sin, especially eternal separation from God — and then offer them the substitutionary redemption of Christ, who took the penalty for all sin on the Cross before conquering sin and death by rising again (Easter!). That’s true compassion. I’d be happy to discuss it with you if you’re ever in my part of the world (Chicago) and want to talk over a cup of coffee. I wouldn’t expect such an upbeat recounting of our conversation as this, but I believe you’d get a more accurate representation of the “theologically conservative” [Christian] position.
I’m sorry: I have ascribed the Christian professor’s wife’s prayer to him. Nevertheless, the same concern applies: can God bless a homosexual union? Not unless He is prepared to bless other sins that are condemned in the Bible. Best–pl
First published in Between the Lines [a Detroit homosexual newspaper] on March 22, 2007
The gentleman stood up during a lull in the Q&A session, and I was grateful for anyone to break the silence. In recent years I’d become used to this routine: I’d go to a small liberal-arts college to speak on homosexuality. The students, who were increasingly pro-gay, would respond with “friendly fire” or genial shrugs. I’d wait for the opposition to speak up, often to no avail.
Then John spoke. “Since there seems to be a lull,” he began, “I suppose that this might be as good a time as any for me to come out…as a religious conservative.”
There were no audible gasps, but there was palpable silence. John identified himself as a faculty member in the music department. He spoke for several long minutes, describing himself as theologically conservative but socially and politically liberal, opposed to same-sex marriage within his church but supportive of civil marriage (and adoption) for gays, skeptical of reconciling biblical faith with homosexual relationships but open to arguments for doing so. He also lamented what he perceived as my hostility toward religious believers (some of it deserved, he admitted) and my too-easy dismissal of opponents.
“We are updating our Fairy Tale Wedding guidelines to include commitment ceremonies,” Disney Parks and Resorts spokesman Donn Walker said. “This is consistent with our policy of creating a welcoming, respectful and inclusive environment for all of our guests.”
Disney will be marketing a fantasy wedding indeed — after all, homosexual pairs cannot obtain a marriage license in Florida or California.
So deluded homosexuals may shell out over $8,000 for a wedding planner, feast, flowers and decorations, and a ride in a giant pumpkin, but, at the stroke of midnight, when the mist clears and the last fleck of glitter floats to the ground, the perverted pair will discover ’twas all merely an illusion. Two men or two women may play dress-up in tiaras and tulle and tuxes (respectively), but afterward they will remain immoral in the eyes of God and unmarried in the eyes of man; same-sex pairs can never experience the mystery of becoming “one flesh” nor the miracle of procreation.
But never mind that — Disney will profit handsomely from such facades, and so they have rationalized:
“We are not in the business of making judgments about the lifestyle of our guests. We are in the hospitality business and our parks and resorts are open to everyone,” Walker said.
One can’t help but wonder: Will Disney now accept “Fairy Tale Wedding” reservations from parties of three or four — now that they’re not making judgments (or upholding state law)?
TAKE ACTION — Walt Disney executives may lack discernment, but we encourage readers to exercise their own. Why not skip “It’s a Small World” and instead plan a family vacation or Bible school field trip to the “Creation Museum,” scheduled to open June 2007 just outside Cincinnati, Ohio — where, among the other “Answers in Genesis,” your kids will learn the Truth about God’s design for human sexuality and marriage:
So God created man in His own image,
in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
— Genesis 1:27
Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” …So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man He made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said,
“This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.”
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. –Genesis 2:18-25
And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply…”
— Genesis 1:28
Publicity shot for Brokeback Mountain: not appropriate for adults, much less for young kids in the classroom
Harry Knox promotes Big Lie for HRC
